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Olympic Torch Blasts Off for Space Station

(NEWSER) – The Russians are taking the Olympic torch relay to a new height—the International Space Station. The 2014 Sochi torch, which will not be lit during its five days in space, blasted off on a Soyuz rocket this morning accompanied by Russia's Mikhail Tyurin, American Rick Mastracchio, and Koici Wakata from Japan. The torch has been to space before, aboard the space shuttle Atlantic before the 1996 Atlanta Games, but two Russian cosmonauts plan to take it on its first spacewalk this week/